Breaking the barrier

[uconnvaulta]

In the vault there are so many aspects you have to focus from the run to the plant to every little thing that you need to do in order to have a good jump. The biggest thing that i think effects people in the polevault is their minds. No matter how great of an athlete you are, if you dont have it in your head, then you are not going to succeed at the vault, or any other sport for that matter. The biggest problem is breaking that barrier of new heights i think. Whether it be jumping 14 feet for the first time or jumping 18. Right now im at the 17 foot barrier, which is gettin better cus i have been gettin over it pretty well now. but for the whole season before it it was the 16 foot barrier, and my freshmen year it was the 16 foot barrier. I had all the things needed to jump that height it was just all in my mind that it was such a hard thing to achieve. Once i got it , it was never a problem again. Does anyone else have this problem. getting over that bar for the first time when you know you can do it. and then once you get it you are like " wow that wasnt that hard" . Breaking that barrier is probably the best feeling, and why i keep vaulting. so do you have barriers that you break even if it isnt in height or what not, what is the barrier and what are the biggest problems vaulters have in getting higher.

[Vault&Flip]

It's definitely mental. Pole Vaulting is probably 90 percent mental when you break it all down.. It's the exact same way with gymnastics. It's not so much fear as it is just having that mental barrier, and saying "Can my body really do that?" Which of course it can, people have been doing this stuff for years. But, there is nothing more frustrating than having a mental block, and nothing more gratifying than overcoming one. It's usually never a problem(that specific aspect or element anyways) ever again. So therefore I conclude I am learning the wrong thing in school, someone teach me not to think.

[VTechVaulter]

i dont usually have a problem with height barriers. i have problems going up poles though. i start trying to hard. same idea, just different app

[Vault&Flip]

i dont usually have a problem with height barriers. i have problems going up poles though. i start trying to hard. same idea, just different app

Ditto.

[vaulter870]

same here i think that pole mess with your head more then heights for me at least.

[Lax PV]

I have had more problems with heights than with poles. I had a big one in high school at 14', and freshman year, and fall of sophmore year I had a big problem with 15'.

Anytime I go up poles, I don't know what the deal is, but my standards are ALWAYS between 65 and 75cm... it might be a comfort thing for rolling the pole over, I guess I havn't given it that much thought.

[TreyDECA]

if my head was in it at all last year, i didn't know it. once i lost that confidence, it's been hard getting it back... it's coming though... i've already gotten up off the ground more times this year that i did all of last year in practice and meets combined. should be fun this year if i can just get the rest of my head out of my a** and stick it hard with my left hand.

[uconnvaulta]

16 feet was my biggest damn mental bar, i could smoke it in practice, but when it came to meets i could never, get it for like a year, my freshmen year at uconn, i could not get it no matter what i did, hen my soph year i got it once , and it hasnt been a probelm since, poles arent really a problem for me, i love gettin on new poles, i mean i look at it like this pole is going to freakin rocket me over this bar, so lets just attack it like crazy

[das_1971]

Yeah, poles are the easy one. I gotta agre that the height barriers are the biggest. Every time I get back to 16ish, i get a new injury

[saraf]

i had that barrier for 16-6 all of last winter and beginning of spring i could jump around 16-3 and 4 and i could get over prity ez but i always put the bar to 16-6 and couldNEVER make it . well eventualy i put it to 16-7 and made that and the next too bars.